Columns

History always has been one of those amorphous topics to most of us, defined by our relationships to events and eventualities more than encyclopedic endeavors.

If you had no reason to have studied the dynasties in China, the crusades to the Middle East or the founding of our nation/state/county, then you probably didn’t, unless someone stuck a book in front of you and required your attention for a semester or so.

I have escaped a scourge of Valentine’s Day that I had feared might stain my life.

No one in my family received a “tattoo Valentine,” and I am forever grateful that their precious hides were spared.

Now, I know those boxes I saw among the kids’ cards at a couple of stores this past weekend didn’t include needles and ink, but they did carry with them, I fear, an impression on delicate minds that was equally dangerous and potentially damaging.

Maybe you were watching the Super Bowl on Sunday with a heartfelt interest in whether the Giants or the Patriots won in what became a sensational and scintillating scenario.
Maybe you, like most of the tens of millions who watched, were more interested in the overpriced and overdeveloped – and sometimes overly stupid – commercials that have become so famous.

Unless you are a devotee of the man himself, you probably had to giggle a bit as I did when I heard Newt Gingrich say recently that he wanted to be nominated for president and challenge Barack Obama to a series of 3-hour, Lincoln-Douglas-style debates on the issues facing our country.

Unless I miss my guess: Honest Abe, the founding Republican, and Short Steve got off a good guffaw from the Great Peanut Gallery in the sky as well.

With the Republican presidential primaries in full swing and the annual “State of the Union” address this week, some of you might have been expecting a column focusing on political matters. However, at least for this week, I am going to employ the rule that my mother always told me and that I’m guessing most of your mothers told you: If you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say anything at all.

So, while I’m sure I won’t be able to remain silent until November, today I’ll go a different direction.

The boy climbed to his seat high in Rupp Arena on Saturday, his every sense keen to the sights and sounds of this famed arena, a Mecca to which he was pilgrimaging for the first time.

He had passed its outer lobby while visiting the Hyatt Regency Hotel, reading the signs, noting the doorways, but his only peeks inside were from the narrow views of pixilated formations on a variety of television screens.

If you are serious about being re-elected, the door of opportunity has been kicked as wide open as the Montana sky.

This isn’t about your ideas for handling our continuing economic morass, the ever-threatening swagger of Iran, the everlasting war on terror in Afghanistan and ever however much you think we should spend on the military going forward.

Those are important, impervious issues, to be sure, but they’re not your real opportunity.